UK deathboffinry spinoff firm Qinetiq says it plans to deploy Transformers combatbots in the Wars On Stuff.
In a release today, the company invites the world to admire MAARS™ (Modular Advanced Armed Robotic System). MAARS is made by Qinetiq's recent American acquisition, Foster-Miller, who are perhaps most famous for their …

COMMENTS

'the MAARS is unable to fire directly at its own control console.'

Hmm, fine when a human is controlling it, but when happens when the Rise Of The Machines finally starts, then it will be no longer human controlled, so presumably its 'controller' will be the first target.

robot wars - you're kidding right?

Anonymous Coward - you've got to be joking. It couldn't go on RW, not because it's not hard enough, but because the arenas weren't hard enough. The newer arena was only 10mm lexan, not enough enough to stop a 9mm pistol round. Thats why they always selected the entries that had low powered weapons.

The other problem with putting it on Robot Wars would be that their safety guys are barely competant to cross the road unaided. They had a nasty accident in 99 with a bot they damaged when putting it in the arena. It went live, and went right through someones foot.

Anyway, its not really any different from some of the stuff that was run at the US competition in the late 90s. At least one team used on-board video, fed to video goggles for weapon control. Most of them were a bit faster than 7mph too. My old middleweight could manage that for about 45 mins of a full charge, and we did think about mounting an airsoft gun, on a turret, for matches. Wasn't enough call for sentry-bots in futuristic airsoft scenarios though, to modify Hard Cheese that way.

Was it only me

Robots instead of humans...

"So every robot on the front will reduce the number of troops and replace them with something that needs a wheelchair ramp for getting over a meter-high stone wall."

A human can control multiple robots. They could even use simple hunter/killer ai-s for fixed path base patrol duty. Most attacks where us soldiers die happen during road based patrols, where a hummer with 4 soldiers inside could be replaced by 4 tracked robots. Loosing a few of them due to roadside bombs doesn't really matter. Combine this with automated trucks and most supply lines could be automated. The downside of all this is that they can be hacked and turned against the us. For getting over a mether high wall, it's better to use a hoovering robot, like a mini helicopter based gun platform.

ps: It's just me or these robots look and work like the heavy weapon platforms seen in the ufo series of games?

Robots don't talk back!

So the US will rule the world with bits of "lethal loaded Lego" that needs no disability pension,ice cream in hot climates and best of all will not throw an emotional wobbly when told to "go to war" which of course is always possible if you join the Crazy Guys in the White House!

Was that a lucid comment...

Lucidity

Yin to Yang in a Quantum Leap.

JP,

The following is awaiting a reply [from whom you will have to use your imagination to imagine] but it does not need them to reply for it to be built upon, for it is never dependent upon anyone and would not be tolerant of anyone who would think it to be so.

It has a definite IT angle, which is why I Register it here for Peer Review and Comment, should IT Tickle your Fancy.

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Done Better than just well in Beta IT and Media will Create AI Lead ……. Which is suitably different and viable and surely something of a Catalyst for Change, readily available to Any and All, Charged and Promising Change.

Is IT to be AI British Job …… or will IT be Outsourced and Controlled from Abroad?

Do not allow the QuITe SurReal Nature of the amfM Approach to cloud Fine Judgement, for it is specifically designed to Hone and Home in on IT, whilst providing all necessary Cover in Ignorant Incredulity to Further XXXXPlore Sensitive Global Control Issues……. For it may very well be the case, that they in whom/to whom Trust and Leadership have been ceded, are not Fit for Purpose, and that Mantle belongs to Others. >>>>

It's robot wars

You say the chassis is similar to that of a mobility buggy. Think again, that thing is straight out of Robot Wars. The house Robot was called Sir Killalot, and used the same ~1m long two track system to mount the "jabbing spear of doom" and "cutting jaws of fear".

In fact the same rubber tracked system had been around for a good 10 years. I first saw it on a building site as the drive mechanism for a very large wheelbarrow. Toot toot, strap a gun to that and your've completed 99% of an A-Team episode.

'...unable to fire directly at its own control console.'

gah, the "safety plice" c*cked it up already

it's fscking WAR fer chrissakes! people get hurt, sometimes badly-sometiems even the pretty boy star gets unlucky and buys the farm. Mechanical turret locks, so enemies who get the data from traitors posting on the net know where they are safer to attack from. Can't fire at it's own control console? All you gotta do is fox it so it thinks the enemy is the control console. Then since the thing is now useless, the enemy sympathizers and political drones can claim they "told us so" even they were the ones that castrated the thing in the first place.

It's like going up to your favorite football center, taping blinders on his head, swinging an aluminum baseball bat to his unprotected groin, and then pointing and saying "See! I told you he wasn't worth hiring!" and getting your own ineffective second cousin hired to take his place.